Driver in fatal wreck has DWI history

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Randall County authorities are checking to determine whether the man behind the wheel of a car that hit and killed a woman and critically injured her 2-year-old daughter was legally permitted to drive, officials said Monday.

Records show Jared Dale Garrison’s license was suspended following a 2009 conviction of driving while intoxicated. Randall County has requested and is waiting to receive Department of Public Safety records in the mail verifying the status of Garrison’s license, Randall County Sheriff Joel Richardson said.

No charges have been filed in Saturday’s incident. Investigators determined Garrison, 20, of Amarillo was not impaired at the time, Richardson said.

Deputies responded about 2:25 a.m. Saturday to a report of a woman lying in an Interstate 27 access road, just south of McCormick Road, Sheriff’s Office spokesman Danny Alexander said in a news release. The caller also saw the injured toddler near Melissa Rico’s body, according to the release.

Witnesses told Randall County authorities Melissa Rico had been drinking before the incident and argued with her boyfriend before leaving an Amberwood Park home about 2 a.m., Richardson said. The home is about a fourth of a mile south of the spot where Rico and her daughter were hit, the sheriff said.

Garrison told investigators the impact shattered the windshield and sent glass flying into his eyes, authorities said. He said he did not know what the car hit, authorities said. Garrison told authorities he drove about 2½ miles to his home and told his mother he had hit something. She drove to the highway, saw flashing lights and returned home to pick up her son, Richardson said. The two then came back to the scene, the sheriff said.

A justice of the peace pronounced Melissa Rico dead at the scene.

Paramedics transported Myra Rico to the hospital, authorities said.

Richardson said investigators had been on the scene about an hour and a half when Garrison returned.

Richardson said Garrison became distraught when investigators told him what happened.

“He had no idea he had hit a human,” Richardson said. “It’s very likely he didn’t know what he hit. It was dark, in the middle of the night. Should he have stopped? Absolutely. Did he? No.”

Deputies smelled Garrison’s breath, conducted a horizontal gaze nystagmus test and concluded he was not impaired, Richardson said. The test checks to see if a person can smoothly follow an object from side to side using only the muscles in the eyes. Intoxicants inhibit the brain to control the muscles, causing the eyes to jerk.

The nystagmus test is used to determine whether further sobriety tests are necessary. In Garrison’s case, they were not, Richardson said.

Deputies recovered the Cavalier and took it to the Randall County sheriff’s Crime Scene Investigation Lab to be processed for evidence, Alexander said. Garrison told investigators he had borrowed the vehicle.

Garrison was convicted in 2009 for driving while intoxicated, court records show. Garrison paid $913 in fines and court costs and was ordered to serve 10 days in the Randall County jail. He served the jail sentence on weekends, records show. Last February, he pleaded guilty to driving without a license.